My unexpected experience on ABRSM Grade 5 exam

[caroline1708]

I just had my ABRSM grade 5 exam yesterday. It was my first exam so I was very nervous. I played the pieces without the book and I totally messed up my first piece; in the last bars I suddenly slipped and forgot what's next so I just went on with totally ugly melody, pretending as if nothing happened. My second and third pieces went quite alright. I could do the sight reading and perhaps most of the aural sections (I couldn't really clap the rhythm because I couldn't remember all the melody).
The problem was the scales. I could do most of the scales with the right tempo but then the examiner asked me to play E flat (Es) minor contrary motion scale. I was very shocked because it was not listed on the syllabus. However, I did it correctly but the tempo was quite slow. Does this kind of thing happen often?
I am afraid of failing my exam (especially because I messed up one of my pieces)..Do I have the chance to pass?

[justanamateur]

Yes, and a very good chance at that! You only messed up one scale and the last bars of one piece.

That one scale is not going to ruin your whole score for scales, and the examiner may even have realised later that he'd made a mistake. However, I suspect you may have borrowed/been given a scales book from the old syllabus (they changed the syllabus a few years ago). Are you sure you aren't using the old one?

As for the last bars, for Grades 1-8, slips (even major ones like this) with never result in a fail as long as the previous parts were played out nicely. There's one student who passed a Grade 8 exam after forgetting everything in the middle of a piece and asking to take out the score. One way to avoid these problems is to memorise both your left hand and your right hand separately, in addition to your regular hands-together memory. Also, avoid excessive reliance on hand memory; use other types of memory. More info can be found in these posts (I haven't read everything ):

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=19183.msg207732#msg207732
https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?PHPSESSID=956529347ef94b38c80293692a3fabb5&topic=10428.msg106849#msg106849

[quantum]

Hi, welcome to Pianostreet.

You did the right thing by playing your way out of the memory slip.  Slips do happen from time to time.  It is more about how elegantly you can recover from one, than the fact that one had occurred.  What you want to avoid if at all possible is stopping cold and panic.  That just draws more attention to the fact that a slip occurred. 

When you are doing rhythm clapback to a melody.  You don't need to remember the melody, focus on rhythm only.  It is a test to see if you can extract only the rhythmic portion of a tune. 

[caroline1708]

Thank you everyone for the tips..I'm sure that I was using the newest syllabus. I should've told him that the scale hadn't been on the syllabus
Yep I need to practice aural more..I am not quite used to it.
It felt so horrible to screw up on the exam day
but you both made me feel better..so thanks a lot
  The result will come in the next three months..hope I'll pass